A Two-step Brunch in Elmhurst’s Thai Town

I am not sure whether brunch is eaten in Thailand. I prefer to think it’s not. For the purpose of this dispatch though, I had a lovely two-part brunch in Elmhurst’s ever expanding Thai town. Stop number one was the newly renovated Sugar Club. In addition to seating and room for an entire table laden with prepared foods and desserts, the expansion includes a café area, which serves up desserts and a savory breakfast called egg pan ($5), or kai kra ta in Thai.

Thai coffee with condensed milk—sweet and invigorating.

Sugar Club’s egg pan is literally just that, an egg sunny side up, served in the pan it’s fried in along with sweet pork sausage, chopped pork loaf, and ground pork. Lovers of all things cute will go gaga over it. Heck I thought it was pretty neat looking until I touched the still hot pan. It comes with a condiment caddy, including ketchup, Maggi, and white pepper. I doctored it up with the latter two, deeming the ketchup too American. It was tasty, but almost hard to believe it was Thai. Nonetheless, with a cup of kha-fai ron, with sweetened condensed milk sitting at the bottom, it made for a nice light breakfast.

Khao Kang’s khanom bueang, the sweetest Thai tacos ever.

My second stop was Khao Kang. My friend Cherry from Pata Paplean had told me that the steam table specialist had an amazing dessert served only on weekends. Boy was she ever right. I could easily eat five or six khanom bueang at a clip and not just because they are a buck apiece. The rice flour crepe smeared with meringue comes with one of two fillings: a sweet one with coconut and foi thong, strands of candied egg yolk, and a savory version filled with ruddy salted coconut seasoned with dried shrimp and sesame seeds. Compare them to tacos if you must. Crunchy and sweet, yet still light they are my new favorite Thai snack. It’s hard to pick a favorite of the two, but for the moment I’ll say the red coconut ones.

Fellow Thai snack fiends take note Khao Kang only makes khanom bueang on weekends. I’m pretty sure I’ll be there Saturday to pick up a few hundred to take to a friend’s party. As I’ve mentioned before it’s a good time to be eating Thai in Elmhurst.

5 or so years back I had some kind of thousand-year egg dish there. Don’t know the exact translation. I was with friends of friends who knew Thai folks who showed up there for Thai music nights which were usually held late on Thursdays if memory serves.
I sympathize with the Thai-Sushi all-in-one avoidance in general.